physics

Ottawa Treaty

Ottawa Treaty is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Ottawa Treaty rather than just read about it. In short: The Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction of 1997, known informally as the Ottawa Treaty, the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, or often simply the Mine Ban Treaty, aims at eliminating anti-personnel landmines (APLs) around the world. By August 2025, 162 states had ratified or acceded to the treaty.

Key takeaways

Ottawa Treaty belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Ottawa Treaty to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Ottawa Treaty from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction of 1997, known informally as the Ottawa Treaty, the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, or often simply the Mine Ban Treaty, aims at eliminating anti-personnel landmines (APLs) around the world. By August 2025, 162 states had ratified or acceded to the treaty. Major powers, which are also past and current manufacturers of landmines, are not parties to the treaty. These include the United States, China, and Russia. Other non-signatories include India and Pakistan. In 2025, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland formally began the procedure to withdraw from the Ottawa Treaty. The three Baltic States, Finland and Poland completed the withdrawal in December 2025, January 2026 and February 2026 respectively. Amidst use of mines by non-signatory belligerent Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian War, Ukraine has not followed the treaty and in 2025 also announced the intent to withdraw, though the treaty stipulates that it should remain in effect until the end of the conflict.

Chronology

1939 Landmines are first used widely in World War II.

1977 During the Geneva Convention, one provision is amended to prohibit the targeting of civilian populations by indiscriminate weapons in wartime.

1980 October: The Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects (CCW) is adopted by a United Nations Conference in Geneva. Among the three annexed Protocols the "Protocol on prohibitions or restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices" (Protocol II) establishes some restrictions on the use of anti-personnel landmines.

1991 Six NGOs supporting a ban of landmines begin organizing the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), established the following year.

1992 October: The Steering committee of the ICBL issues a call for an international ban on the use, production, stockpiling and sale, transfer or export of anti-personnel landmines.

1993 9 February: France formally submits a request to the Secretary-General of the UN to convene a Review Conference of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) in accordance with its Article 8 in order to strengthen the provisions in the Convention on the use of anti-personnel landmines.

The First International NGO Conference on Landmines is held in London, organised by the ICBL and acknowledging Jody Williams as the organization's coordinator. The US Department of State publishes its report Hidden Killer: The Global Problem with Uncleared Landmines, and the ICBL issues the study Landmines: A Deadly Legacy. 16 December: The UN General Assembly adopts Resolution 48/79 which formally welcomes the request to convene a Review Conference of the CCW, encourages the establishment of a group of governmental experts to prepare this Conference and calls upon the maximum number of States to attend (operative paragraphs 5–7).

1994 24 February: The President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Cornelio Sommaruga, declares that from a humanitarian point of view, a "worldwide ban on anti-personnel mines [is] the only truly effective solution" to come to terms with the problem.

Subsequently, certain UN bodies such as the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the United Nations Children's Fund, and the Secretary-General himself call for a total ban on anti-personnel mines. 10 July: The Group of Seven Industrialised Nations (G7) at its meeting in Naples inter alia assign priority to the problem of anti-personnel mines (APMs).

September: At the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) US President Bill Clinton calls for the "eventual elimination" of anti-personnel mines.

15 December: The UN General Assembly adopts Resolution 49/75 D "Moratorium on the Export of Anti-Personnel Land-Mines", which urges States to declare such a moratorium, stating, inter alia:

Recognizing that States can move effectively towards the ultimate goal of the eventual elimination of anti-personnel land-mines as viable and humane alternatives are developed. Emphasizes the importance of the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects and its Protocols as the authoritative international instrument governing the responsible use of anti-personnel land-mines and related devices. [operative paragraph 4]

Encourages further international efforts to seek solutions to the problems caused by anti-personnel-mines, with a view to their eventual elimination [operative paragraph 6].

Early action and draft Conventions

1994 Self-imposed moratorium on sales of mines dated 15 March 1994

1995 The first national law to ban anti-personnel landmines is passed in Belgium.

12 May: The Council of the European Union adopts a "Common Action" on anti-personnel landmines including a common moratorium on the export of anti-personnel landmines.

The improvement of the legal restrictions on the use of anti-personnel mines contained in Protocol II of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) proves to be an uphill task. Four meetings of the group of governmental experts are necessary to prepare the basis for the Review Conference of this Convention because of difficulties in reaching consensus.

25 September to 13 October: The first Review Conference of the 1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) is held in Vienna (Austria). The focus is on its Protocol II, as it is the authoritative international instrument governing the responsible use of anti-personnel land-mines. Many improvements are proposed, but in spite of intensive debates, do not find consensus. The Review Conference therefore has to be suspended.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Ottawa Treaty

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Ottawa Treaty claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Ottawa Treaty before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Ottawa Treaty ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Ottawa Treaty

In research: Ottawa Treaty appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Ottawa Treaty in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Ottawa Treaty is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1990s in Ottawa, 1997 in Ontario, Arms control treaties, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Ottawa Treaty outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Ottawa Treaty in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Ottawa Treaty means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Ottawa Treaty out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Ottawa Treaty in simple terms?

Why does Ottawa Treaty matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Ottawa Treaty?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Ottawa Treaty.